European Day of Languages
Wednesday, 26 September was European Day of Languages and the Primary Phase had a fantastic day celebrating!
The European Day of Languages is designed to highlight the importance of language learning, as well as to celebrate linguistic diversity.
The Primary Phase has numerous members of staff who are able to speak multiple languages and in Key Stage 2, pupils benefit from a weekly French lesson.
The day started with a whole school assembly, led by 5GL, where they showcased their ability to talk about the solar system in French! Later in the day, each class celebrated a different language and culture. Children learned French, Spanish, German, Italian and Polish! They sampled food from the countries and took part in cultural and craft activities.
Year 2 especially enjoyed European Day of Languages. They tried polish food, practiced their conversation skills, created paper crafts and sang a traditional Polish celebration song. The children enjoyed the sweet treats but did not enjoy eating polish sauerkraut!
It was a wonderful afternoon filled with fun, laughter and learning! The children (and staff!) thoroughly enjoyed themselves and continue to talk about what they learned on European Day of Languages.
My thanks to all the staff who worked hard to make it a memorable day for all.
View this article on our Website… Y11 Badminton Doubles Tournament
On Monday, 17 September, two Year 11 girls competed in the South Manchester Badminton Doubles Tournament and played matches against five other schools.
The girls beat some very strong opposition to finish third overall and pick up the Bronze medals.
Well done to Neha and Aimen!
View this article on our Website… Summer Reading Challenge Stars!
Students who successfully completed the Gold Level of the WHGS Summer Reading Challenge received their certificates.
Year 9 student Edi, Year 8 students Sania and Dana, and Year 3 students Amal, Maryam, Halima and Omar were presented with the award in recognition of their commitment to reading throughout the summer break.
The competition was inspired by the national Summer Reading Challenge scheme delivered in public libraries and has been designed to encourage students to pursue their enjoyment of reading and continue to build their literacy skills throughout the holiday period.
Students who took part all achieved the target of six books required for Gold Level.
Two lucky students, who were drawn at random – Sania and Amal – have also won a book of their own choice, which will be ordered for them by Miss Daly.
Mr O’Brien and Miss Daly would like to say a huge thank you and many congratulations to those students who participated.
View this article on our Website… Beth Tweddle Visit
On Monday, 8 October, Beth Tweedle, the ex-GB Olympic gymnast gave an inspirational speech to our Year 10 and 11 GCSE students, as well as several hand picked Gifted and Talented students.
This provided a unique opportunity for the students, as they were able to ask insightful questions to the ex-athlete about her progress from a junior athlete to the GB standard that she reached. Students within the assembly commented:
“Beth’s visit was inspirational and demonstrated perfectly that with hard work you can achieve what you want.”
“ I was really inspired by what she said and how far she got.”
It was great to have Beth in the PE Department.
View this article on our Website… Y10/Y11 Bridgewater Hall Visit
The Music Department got to spend a Friday afternoon out of school and attend a well received concert at the Bridgewater Hall, featuring the Halle Orchestra on 28 September 2018.
Twenty-four talented Music students from Year 10 and 11 GCSE Music classes and music ensembles listened inattentively from the Renaissance to the modern era. A commentary, video links and instrumental changes provided a real insight into the movements that took place in the orchestra from 1600s to the 20th century.
The concert was designed to support the students' curriculum studies and many commented on how it helped to bring their classroom learning to life and deepen their understanding, in readiness for their future exams.
View this article on our Website… Y9 Football Team watch MUFC v Derby
As part of their team building, Year 9 Boys Football Team went to watch the Manchester United v Derby match on Tuesday, 25 September 2018.
They even took part in some filming for MUTV, giving their opinions on the match and result. View this article on our Website… Henshaws Visit (October)
For the first time this academic year, WHGS welcomed Henshaws to the school with lunch and musical performances from the lower school Choir, Percussion Group and Solo / Duets.
The Percussion Group led with an improvised piece, featuring Francis on the cajon and other talented students on the djembe. In addition, the 30 strong Choir in Year 7 and 8 gave their rendition of 'This is Me' from 'The Greatest Showman'.
To finish, Nathanial gave a piano solo 'Strange Things Happen', Francis returned with a guitar solo and Rebecca and Zara made their debut performance as a duet item, with piano and vocals.
Thank you to all students and staff involved.
View this article on our Website… Y4 Wild Roadshow
Year 4 had a very exciting and informative visit from the Wild Roadshow this week, as part of their Living Things and Habitats topic.
During the day, the children found out all about different types of animals, such as bearded dragons, millipedes, tarantulas, snakes and giant snails. They were curious (like Colin the Camel) and asked a variety of interesting questions.
The children were extremely brave, as many of them conquered their fears and held the animals. It was a fantastic end to the topic! View this article on our Website… KS3 Manchester Art Gallery Trip
The Art Department took a small group of specially selected students to visit the Manchester Art Gallery on Tuesday, 16 October, for a workshop with an artist and poet.
They were selected due to their excellent attitude to learning in Art and were fantastic during the trip. They created some lovely poetry and visual art. This was a fantastic opportunity to work with professional artists and poets.
View this article on our Website… Y7 Girls’ Football v TEMA
Year 7 girls football beat TEMA 2-1 to progress to the Quarter Finals of the knockout competition.
They will play Co-op Academy in the new year.
Great team effort with some amazing young lady’s who are a pleasure to teach. Nursery's Funky Fingers
In the Nursery we have introduced our Funky Fingers in the morning before registration. The parents help their children to complete some activities, such as threading and attaching small pegs to straws. This might seem easy but it’s quite tricky and really helps our little ones to improve their fine motor skills in preparation for their early writing skills.
Thank you to our parents/carers for their support.
View this article on our Website… Y11 Sports Leaders' Athletics Festival
On Friday, 12 October, our Year 11 Sports Leaders were honoured to have been chosen to organise and manage a Year 10 and Year 11 Athletics Festival at Sports City.
The students were in charge of organising and hosting the whole event, leading on all activities, which included shot putt, high jump, long jump and track events; even being in charge of announcing each event so the session ran to time and recording the scores and positions so finishing positions could be finalised for the schools participating in the event(s).
Our students received great feedback from the schools and staff who attended, commenting on how professional and organised our students were throughout the whole session.
The event was hosted by Manchester Schools PE Association, who look for confident and able young leaders to organise events, like this Athletics Festival.
We would like to congratulate all of our Sports Leaders who organised a fantastic event:
Fatima, Swafiya, Tanea, Tehmina, Palvasha, Hira, Rabia, Neha, Chidinma, Catherine, Nate, Davie, Nicky, Tanaka and Fudia. Well done to you all. View this article on our Website… Autumn Term in Year 1M
Year 1M have had a great start to the year and settled in well to class. They have been exploring animals including humans, during science lessons, with one of their favourite lessons being exploring the senses. The children had to learn senses that matched different parts of the body. They joined in with some senses activities to learn how they use their senses and how to describe them.
They had lots of fun and did a great job, coming up with some fantastic adjectives this lesson.
Let’s keep up the amazing work Year 1M! View this article on our Website… Y10-Y13 Artist Workshop
The artist Alan Birch visited WHGS on Friday, 19 October 2018, to work with Year 10-13 students creating beautiful prints.
The groups created very unique prints relevant to their individual projects. The workshop consisted of some printmaking experience covering such techniques as:
• Dry Point • Etching • Relief Printing • Collograph • Mono Printing
View this article on our Website… Y2B Support World Mental Health Day
Year 2B enjoyed showing support to World Mental Health Day on Wednesday, 10 October 2018.
We discussed the importance of reading for mental health and we found some fun and exciting places to read as a class. View this article on our Website… Children in Need
As we have done for many years, the school raised money for Children Need on Thursday, 15 November. This year we held a school ‘Bake Off’, as well as holding non-uniform day to raise money.
The school ‘Bake off’ was a great success, with both staff and students baking some amazing cakes and cupcakes, which were all sold off to raise money. The individual winners of the ‘Bake Off’ were Shahad Barkhad (9GP) and Tehmina Qureshi (11LMT).
In total the ‘Bake Off’ raised £271.95. With this added to the non- uniform money, in total the school raised £1425.69 for a fantastic cause.
View this article on our Website… Reception read 'Rosie's Walk'
It has been a busy half term in Reception.
After reading the story ‘Rosie’s Walk’, we have told and shared our own stories with confidence and enthusiasm. This inspired us to take an Autumn walk around school, follow instructions and collect natural resources to use for our own artwork.
We created our own maps which led to us finding our own treasure on the last day of term!
View this article on our Website… Remembrance Day Commemorations
On Friday, 9 November, our talented students We will always remember those who took to the stage of the Great Hall to heroically sacrificed their today for our commemorate the lives lost during the First tomorrow. World War. To mark the centenary of the end by Sania Siddiq, 8DTE of the War, ex-students of William Hulme's who died in the conflict were remembered, Students in the Secondary Phase Design Club conveying how ordinary they were before decorated school reception with a they went away to fight and how they were so Remembrance Day display, which included much like ourselves. strings of poppies, silhouettes of soldiers and large poppies and plaques. Monologues and poems, written and performed by our students, portrayed the Just after morning break, at 11.10am, Mrs impact on the soldiers themselves and on the Goodier (Head of Music) played The Last Post, women and children at home, as civilians which was followed by a 2 minutes silence. were caught up in the horrific effects of the War. The assembly was so touching that we It was a poignant day as we commemorated were even asked to perform it for Primary 100 years since the end of World War I and Phase! remembered the fallen.
View this article on our Website… A Tribute: Stan Lee - A Marvel-lous Man
Students from WHGS were deeply saddened to learn of the passing of comics genius, Stan Lee, yesterday, Monday, 12 November.
On his last visit to the school, Stan’s close friend and former colleague at Marvel Comics, Tim Quinn, told students about Stan’s life and work and portrayed a man who used his boundless imagination to achieve unforgettable characters and storylines and, in so doing, inspired generations of fans.
View this article on our Website… Y11 Gateways Visit – Skills for Success
On Thursday, 15 November, a group of Year 11 The visit began with an introduction to note- Reflection was undertaken at each stage of the students attended a “The Skills for Success” Day taking, which was followed by a short and process: from working as a group, to evaluating Gateways Visit to the University of Manchester. interactive lecture on the topic for the day, the resources and, finally, to the quality of the which was “The Royal Wedding of Prince Harry presentation. The aim of the day was to develop The group participated in various activities and and Meghan Markle and whether it should have reflective students who are aware of the process the event was attended by two other schools, been such a lavish event, considering it was required to complete a task and were able to Abraham Moss Community School and Saint mainly funded by the Tax payer”. This gave the identify areas for improvement. Anthony’s Catholic College. students the opportunity to practice their new skills. Students were then grouped according to All the students were presented with Certificates The “Skills for Success” Day focused on their general subject interests and given an at the end of the day. The students thoroughly improving learners’ awareness of University information pack of resources, along with a enjoyed the experience, commenting “I really learning styles through the completion of a series of questions to answer. The questions enjoyed the experience. I am sure that the skills I group research enquiry into topical issues. The formed the basis for a presentation that the have learnt and developed will help me with my students mixed with students from other schools students delivered to everyone at the end of the GCSEs, as well as at College and, hopefully, at and developed communication and group-work day. University”. skills, learning from each other’s experience. View this article on our Website… Switch Off Fortnight 2018
Here are some of the things that the children will be doing during Switch Off Fortnight:
Year 1 are planning a lesson about the energy we use in our classroom - identifying different things we use and thinking about how we could use less energy. Then they will have a look at renewable energy sources and make paper windmills. Year2 will be playing games around saving energy (Power Patrol and Power Puzzles) and then presenting their findings to the class. They will be making posters to go around school about saving energy and have a home learning task about saving energy at home. Year 4 will be doing some cross curricular writing, writing a letter home to their parents to persuade them to switch off lights and save energy around the house. Year 5 are researching how to save energy by exploring the Switch Off Fortnight website. They will be patrolling school corridors in teams and awarding certificates to classes who are saving energy when rooms are not in use. Year 6 have a number of tasks. There first task will be to complete an audit of wasted energy at home and in school and then each child will make a pledge of how they will make it better, creating a contract to be held accountable for.
View this article on our Website… Y10 Boys' Football v Newall Green
Our Year 10 Boys' Football Team played Newall Green High School last night, winning 8-0 and putting in a fantastic performance. Goal scorers were Oliver (2), Conor (2), Ahmed, Muhamid and Micahiah (2).
The boys that played were a credit to the school: Ahad, Conor, Finlay, Hassan, Muhamid, Ahmed, Akash, Oliver, Ayo, Micahiah, Alfie, Thomas, Joel and Refatul. View this article on our Website… Well done to you all! Primary Phase Assault Course
In the Primary Phase, Years 1-6 took part in a monster assault course, as part of their sponsorship for a GB athlete visit!
They had to use a growth mindset in order to complete a range of challenges - without giving up!
It was an exhilarating day and, despite the cold weather, all children completed the course, feeling extremely proud of their achievements.
View this article on our Website… Manchester Homeless Shoebox Appeal
Staff, students and parents at William Hulme's have worked hard over the last 3 weeks collecting shoeboxes filled with Christmas gifts for the homeless in Manchester.
Manchester has the most homeless people outside of London, with the numbers increasingly significantly in recent years.
We have supported the Homeless Shoebox Appeal for the last few years, but this year we have collected a record 59 filled shoeboxes! The boxes contained items like socks, gloves, toiletries, sweets and chocolate. One Year 7 student even included a letter that they had written.
We have been delighted with the generosity of staff, students and parents, and have had a small team of Year 7's and Year 8's who gave up lots of their free time to collect and organise the boxes. It was a brilliant team effort!
Well done to everyone who contributed!
View this article on our Website… Reception Learn About Diwali
We learnt about and celebrated Diwali in Reception this term.
We were very lucky to have a dance workshop and Aaditya’s mum came in and showed us how to make Diwali sweets.
We also made Diva lamps.
View this article on our Website… Art and Design Exhibition
On Wednesday, 27 November 2018, we held the first joint WHGS Art and Design Exhibition with Stockport Academy.
It was a fantastic evening, which showcased artwork by Year 10, 11 and A-Level students and also outstanding Design Technology 3D pieces.
The collection also included beautiful painted glasswork by WHGS Sixth Form students and fantastic mixed media work by Stockport Academy. View this article on our Website… Y11-Y13 Careers Events 2018
On Friday, 30 November, WHGS held a Careers Day for Years 11, 12 and 13. Three experienced Careers Professionals spent the day interviewing students and giving them guidance and advice on the different career routes and opportunities available for students.
Between 4-6 December, Drop-in Sessions were arranged during lunchtimes. A Career Advisor helped students with their questions and showed them the different possible routes for all types of careers. Students could discuss a wide range of topics, including entry requirements, places of study, the range of courses offered by different establishments, the facilities offered by different educational establishments. The Career Advisor helped students further, by giving them hints and tips on how best to complete various sections of their Application Forms.
Students really enjoyed the Career events and found them helpful, insightful and found the advice and guidance invaluable. One student commented, “It has been brilliant. I found the experience to be really helpful, because I wasn’t clear which route I wanted to take and the Career Advisor cleared up everything. Now I can see clearly which route I’m going to take and what grades I need.”
Another student commented, "The Career Advisor helped me prepare for my career as I had no idea how competitive places were.I was also given advice on what routes would be best for me. My future career path seems much clearer, and I am confident that if I don’t get the grades I can take another route.”
View this article on our Website… 7T Learn About the Middle Ages
This term in Humanities, 7T have been learning about the Middle Ages.
As part of the topic, they have learnt about the defensive features of motte- and-bailey and stone castles. To help understand the different features and how they were designed to protect the castle, they designed and then built their own.
In pairs, they collected different recycling materials and then constructed the castles over a series of lessons. Their castles included mottes made from papier mache, keeps made from milk cartons and houses in the baileys made from egg boxes! They were very creative, even making drawbridges and merlons for their keeps.
7T showed really good teamwork skills and the end result was a set of excellent motte-and-bailey castles.
Well done 7T!
View this article on our Website… Y2D Properties of Different Materials
Y2D have spent this half term looking at the properties of different materials.
We searched for different materials inside and outside of our classroom. We investigated how to change their shape. We also decided why different materials were suited to different purposes.
Our topic ended when we had a very naughty visitor! An elf sneaked into our classroom and made a mess with so much rubbish! We had to organise the mess by deciding if the materials were recyclable and how we would make sure this happened.
View this article on our Website… Y12 Sociology Manchester Museums Trip
On Thursday, 29 November 2018, a group of our Y12 Sociology students met at St Peter's Square, which was the site of the Peterloo Massacre in 1819, where 80,000 working class Mancunians protested for universal suffrage and were charged at by government cavalry.
We then visited Chetham's Library, where Karl Marx studied to find inspiration for the Communist Manifesto, followed by the People's History Museum, where students learned more about Peterloo and the working-class movement in Manchester.
Finally, we visited the Pankhurst Centre, where Emmeline Pankhurst once lived and we learned about how Manchester was the centre of the fight for women's suffrage in the early 20th Century.
View this article on our Website… Manchester Schools Senior Table Tennis Competition
On Wednesday, 5 December, three of our students, Will, Ahmed and Paige, attended the Manchester Schools Senior Table Tennis Competition at Our Lady’s RC High.
The standard was really high with students from all over Manchester competing. Out of 40 boys, Will finished 9th and Ahmed 11th.
Well done to all three students. View this article on our Website… Y4W - The Terrible Tudors
This half term, Year 4 have been learning all about the Tudors. Our focus has been on Henry VIII. We have learnt about his personality, why he had so many wives and how he changed the religion of England.
We have also learnt about the Spanish Armada and Tudor crimes and punishment. As part of our work, 4W produced an assembly about Henry VIII and his wives. This ‘X factor’ assembly included judges Simon Cowell, Louis Walsh and Cheryl Cole, as well as a Tudor dance and a musical number at the end of the assembly.
View this article on our Website… Manchester Schools Y8 Track Cycling
Students in Year 8 took part in Manchester Schools' Track Cycling group stages. Our Year 8 students beat Our Lady’s, Burnage and Manchester Academy to qualify for the finals next Summer. In the two previous years, we have won the Championships and finished Runners Up, so WHGS has a good pedigree in this event.
View this article on our Website… Primary Phase GB Athlete Visit
In the Primary Phase, Years 1-6 had an exciting visitor last week! Gold medal winning, GB Athlete, Hannah Russell came into school to talk to us about how she achieved her dream of winning a gold medal in the Olympics, despite facing many challenges on the way.
We felt inspired to reach our own dreams by using our growth mindset learning powers after listening to Hannah in assembly. Then, each class showed off their sporting skills in a session led by Hannah. We even got the chance to see her gold medal up close!
Thank you to everyone who raised sponsorship money for this event and thank you to Hannah for a fantastic day!
View this article on our Website… Y8 Gateways Familiarisation Visit
On Wednesday, 5 December 2018, a group of Year 8 students were involved in a 'Familiarisation' Visit to the University of Manchester, as part of the Gateways Programme.
There were three other schools at the visit, Loreto High School, Albion Academy and Hathershaw College. This visit focused on the large and diverse range of disciplines offered in Higher Education.
Students participated in the Alphabet Challenge activity, designed to getting them thinking about the range of subjects on offer at the University. In the morning session, students worked in school groups and interviewed current students about four aspects of student life:
• Studying and Learning • Social Life and Societies • Living Away from Home • Job and Career Prospects
The majority of the visit was spent in mixed-school groups, undertaking three 30 minute workshops:
• STEM • Biology, Medicine and Health • Humanities
These workshops showcased a specific aspect of studying this subject at University.
The students found the event insightful and informative, as well as being enjoyable. One of the students commented, “The activities were really fun and I enjoyed interacting with other students from different schools.” View this article on our Website… Y1A - Handa's Surprise
Year 1A have enjoyed their topic on Handa's Surprise this half term!
We have been thinking about how to make our stories more exciting by using interesting adjectives.
To help us think of adjectives to describe the fruits in the story, we tasted some of them to see what they were like! We loved the juicy, spiky leaved pineapple, but we were not too sure about the creamy, squishy avocado! We tried guava for the first time and thought it was delicious!
View this article on our Website… Bebras Competition and Oxford Challenge
In November, all Key Stage 3 students took part in Bebras entrants in the Secondary school age groups that “Bebras”, a hugely popular national competition of score in the top 10% nationally are personally invited to puzzle solving, or “Computational Thinking”. This year’s take part in the “TCS Oxford Computing Challenge”, an competition attracted record numbers, a total of invitation-only, online competition that takes part in 201,000 students took part, and although this was our school in March. first attempt, WHGS did extremely well! I can confirm that invited to take part in TCS OCC are: In total, 463 WHGS students took part in the Junior and Intermediate competitions, out of only 2032 in Greater Year 7 Manchester, so we made up nearly a quarter of Romain Thuret, Reema Abdul-Majeed, Ashar Khalid, Manchester entrants. Aleeza Waseem, Isaac Maouati, Rasty Suleiman
But there’s more... Year 9* Aleena Salmaan and Anying Lin
View this article on our Website… This Term in Y1M
Year 1M have had a super term and been having lots of fun exploring new areas of their learning. In Maths, they have been working really hard to learn their number bonds to 20, as well as addition within 20. They used many different types of resources to help them and had great concentration carrying out different activities.
Year 1M have also had lots of fun exploring painting, in Art, this term. They worked well in partners to solve how to mix paints to make new colours. They learned all about their primary, secondary and tertiary colours, so that they could create their own painting at the end.
Also, in Science, Year 1M have been learning all about the seasons. They were very curious about the changes between Autumn and Winter and were excited to explore their surroundings to identify changes they could see outside.
View this article on our Website… Henshaws Christmas Visit
The Henshaws lunchtime performance provided a great opportunity to showcase some of the acts that were going to perform in the WHGS Christmas Concert that evening and it was no surprise that students were raring / energized and in the Christmas spirit.
The afternoon began with lovely solos from Rhea (Year 9) singing ‘Fly Me To The Moon‘ and Lexie (Year 11) ‘singing Cry Me A River’. The Percussion Group, accompanied by the audience, played their own composition called ‘World Beats’. To finish, the Grace Notes Choir gave their own jazzy renditions of ‘Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas’, Santa Claus Is Coming To Town’ and finished off with ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’.
At almost and hour of musical entertainment, with added audience participation on the jingle bells and sing along parts, our audience definitely left in the Christmas spirit. Well done to all students and staff involved. View this article on our Website… Christmas Card Competition
Secondary Phase Winner Areeba Raza (7SDK) – Gaskell House
Primary Phase Winner Michidmaa Sukhbaatar (5GL) – Byrom House Christmas Card Competition Christmas Concert
Straight after the success of the Henshaws Lunchtime performance, Music students raised their performance levels even further and on offer were a diverse range of vocal and instrumental ensembles in this year's Christmas Concert.
Not only did the Concert welcome old favorites like the Ukulele Orchestra, Steel Band, Brass Ensemble, Gospel Singers, All-Star Cuban Band and Choir, but with the emergence of new groups including a newly formed Year 7 Band – it made it a fantastic night of music- making.
The night was complete with a rendition from all musicians, vocalists, and even the audience, of ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’.
All parties helped raise £100 for Beachwood Cancer Care.
Well done to all staff and students involved.
View this article on our Website… 7T Trip to the Science & Industry Museum
7T visited the Museum of Science and Industry on Wednesday, 12 December.
We walked to St Werburghs Road tram stop and travelled on the tram to Deansgate. We learnt how to buy a ticket and travel safely. From there we walked to MoSI, where we enjoyed a range of activities. We visited the Experiment (hands on) gallery, had a cotton mills machine demonstration, took part in the Science Showdown and completed an activity trail in the Electricity exhibition.
7T learnt lots throughout the day and represented William Hulme's really well.
Well done 7T!
View this article on our Website… Carol Singing at The Lowry Outlet
For the third year in a row, afternoon slot, shoppers stopped Members of the local community be in the Shopping Centre at the members of the WHGS Grace Notes to take a break and enjoy the shared lovely comments and gave time. Francis House being the Choir were asked back by popular Christmas cheer and vocals of all generously to charitable causes. named charity that the Lowry/we demand to perform at the Lowry pupils. collected for. Outlet Mall. They sang fantastically and Whilst we were there, we also met represented to school excellently in James, a lovely boy who attends Well done to all students and staff During the lunchtime and late a beautifully decorated Mall. Francis House and just happened to involved. View this article on our Website…